"Senera?" asked Harmad shakily, fearing his superior's reaction. He had just returned from a patrol flight, and had some rather nasty news.
"What news, Harmad?" asked Senera peaceably. He was lounging in a crag of rock, watching the clouds roll by. His red and ivory scales shone brightly in the daylight.
"There's a strange cloud headed for us," replied Harmad lamely.
"So?" replied Senera. He yawned widely, taking in the fresh desert air. "There are many strange clouds in this world. You cat-birds are very strange creatures."
"Well, I'm afraid it's a quite different type of strange," Harmad croaked. "Granire was leading the patrol, and he decided he'd fly into it to investigate. Something within—he was writhing in midair and—he fell to the ground. He was strangled to death, as far as I can tell. The same happened to the rest of our patrol, but I managed to get away." He was trembling with terror, as the poor griffin had never seen suck wanton destruction and death. Several who had died had been good friends of his. It hurt him to know that they would never live to be seen again.
"I want to see this for myself," said Senera, lazily rising. "Muster the dragons; we're moving out! I want that golden griffin back," he snarled. "If that Flury thinks he can outsmart me so easily, he has another thing coming." The mud brown griffin had startled Senera's usually cocky attitude into a cautious one. Senera's spies had seen Elda leave the continent for the country of the griffins, and he had been forced to move his entire army across the ocean, into the southwestern desert of the griffin's continent. The task had been momentous. Senera was not about to forgive Flury for it.
Senera extended his powerful wings and flew to the valley below, where about ten dragons were idling, surrounded by many griffins. The ground was littered with the remains of the animals they had been eating for the last week.
He saw enough of the general attitude of his remaining troops to sensibly fly higher. A swirling mass of dark energy was speeding through the sands, killing everything in its path. Senera's eyes widened, and he plummeted a few feet before regaining his composure.
"It's coming!" he roared. "Move out!" But it was far too late for Senera or his underlings. All that was left of them was a pile of carcasses, their unseeing eyes open and wide with fear.
None had survived; save for Harmad. He had passed through it unharmed, but he hadn't a clue why. He felt the brush of something familiar on his face, and then the cloud had swirled out of existence. His neck, which had usually been adorned with Senera's Crest, was devoid of it. He remembered taking it off to preen, but what did that have do with it?
"I knew Senera was mad," he said, shaking his head. He flew off into the distance, heading for home.
"Is that supposed to be a city?" shouted Querida, suspended from Elda's talons.
"I'm afraid so," said Cazak, gliding nearby.
"We must rest for a few days," gasped Flury, who was flying once more. They all curved their wings in a downward angle, the griffins spiraling and Bolero dropping like a stone. The huge dragon landed heavily about a hundred yards from the first house, while all the griffins an their cargo landed in the center square of city itself.
"Water!" shouted Blade, forgetting himself completely and diving into the white and gray flecked marble fountain that occupied the center of the market square. The fountain was in the shape of a great griffin with wings that looked more like fire than wings. The others were more subdued than Blade, though they all immersed themselves in the water as well. It didn't matter to anyone that the griffins and people of the town were staring quizzically at them. Some children that were playing near a market stall that sold fruit were laughing and pointing with glee.
Flury didn't feel like making a fool of himself, though. He was too tired to run, and had no wish to get wet.
"Flurian Atreck, you have some explaining to do," came a voice from behind him. He knew that voice.
"Camilan," said Flury nervously, not looking at the gigantic male griffin he knew was towering behind him.
"I don't know why you're here, but I assume you need somewhere to stay," he continued, not heeding Flury's obvious inability to speak. "I can get your old room ready if you'd like."
"What about my friends?" asked Flury, still not looking.
"You mean the idiots in the fountain?" asked Camilan.
"Erm, yes," he said rather shakily.
"Well, I suppose Hesian's room would do for the women," he said unenthusiastically.
"I don't WANT all of them in my room!" said Hesian hotly, leaping from his repository in a flurry of filthy fox.
"That's a nice spell you're under, Hesian," commented Camilan. Flury turned to face him, as Hesian's presence gave him a little more courage.
"Can you break it?" asked Hesian excitedly. Camilan frowned.
"You mean you can't?" he asked.
"It's completely beyond my ability," admitted the little fox.
"I don't understand," he said. "It's only one layer, and not a very strong one at that. I'd like to know the idiot who cast it."
"It doesn't matter who cast it," said Hesian ferociously. "I can't break, and neither can Flury." He shook his head in disapproval.
"I'm not going to remove it for you, if you can't see it yourself," said Camilan. "Think, Hesian, think."
"I did think," he said.
"Obviously not enough."
Flury had mixed feelings about returning to his home. It meant he would have to face more time with Camilan, as well as any of his other peers still in training. Most of his old friends (and enemies) were probably still there, because most of them had begun at least two years after Flury and Hesian, when Camilan had decided to increase the number of students he took. He had lived in Camilan's reserve for almost five years, from the time he was ten to his sixteenth birthday. For three years after he had worked for the government, ultimately getting the assignment to follow his renegade cousins to Derk's continent.
He looked round his old room with a mixture of aversion and longing. This room was the place he had gotten into a fight with Ieras, his first true enemy. He had no doubt that Ieras was still living in the desert city, if he was not still in Camilan's dormitories. It was also the place where he had scryed without aid of the elements for the first time, as well as the location of several late night talks with Hesian and his other friends.
He looked wanly at a tiny red splotch of blood adorning the worn tapestry of the east wall. It depicted a huge golden griffin carrying a limp, but warlike human in its talons. The tapestry was so old that Flury could not see the face of the human or the griffin's feathers in any clear detail, nor the clothing the human wore. The blood was a remnant of Flury's fight with Ieras.
His room was big enough to hold all the males in the party, and had room to spare. Camilan had furnished the room with scarlet cushions that lay everywhere, ready to be piled into beds. Some rough blankets for the humans lay neatly folded to the left of the door.
"It's good to be back," said Hesian, wandering around excitedly. You know, I can still smell everyone that we went to school with."
"So can I," said Flury softly. His mind had returned to Elda, and his stomach was suddenly filled with butterflies. He went to the permanent pile of orange cushions that he had once slept on, and dropped immediately. He was asleep within minutes, ignoring the others as they went to and fro, discussing their plans.
When he awoke, it was the deep of the night. The moon shone through the giant glass window on the wall opposite the door, and he felt it calling him to bask in the light.
Like a sleepwalker, he staggered outside, making as little noise as possible.
"When the moon made its call, the griffins they did answer," came Bolero's voice softly in his mind.
"Where is that from? It sounds familiar," Flury answered.
"It comes from the Book of Astronomy," said Elda's voice beside him. "She's talking to me as well."
"The Book of Astronomy?" asked Flury. "That line sounds more poetic than scientific."
"It is a poem," she replied. "It's a collection of poetry about griffins and their connection to the sky."
"I'd like to read it someday. I'm sure I've heard someone quote it to me before," Flury said quietly.
"I'm sure you have."
"Why are we out here?"
"Bolero thinks it's time I made a decision. She says you know what Hesian told me. Is this true?"
"I heard him. It's difficult to forget."
"Then it's true?"
"It's true. I love you." Flury gave a strained sort of chuckle and fell over in a dead faint.
"Flury!" Elda said furiously as he crashed to the ground. "He really overreacts sometimes," she hissed to Bolero. "You didn't let me tell you my decision, idiot."
"I suppose you can't help but love someone who would faint over you," Bolero remarked.
"That's true," said Elda. "I've never fainted over anyone before, myself. Sometimes I wish I was half the wizard he is, but being him would be so difficult. He's ever so twitchy and nervous."
"And you're stuck with him," the dragon chuckled. She was actually a mile away, in a gully of sand. "Poor Flurian!" she laughed.
Elda sighed and settled next to Flury, waiting patiently for his return to consciousness. It was a good thing that they had been talking in a grove of palms out of the way of everyone else, or Flury's awakening would have been a lot more embarrassing than it already was.
"What happened," he whispered, shaking his head as he tried to get his bearings. What had he been doing las—oh, no! Did Elda run away in disgust? He turned his head to his other side—and there was Elda, staring at him pensively. Morning had come while he was unconscious.
"Is there a reason you had to faint?" she asked impatiently. "I was going to tell you that I had decided that-" she paused to sigh in exasperation, "that I can't help but love you, too." This being said, she looked at him for a reply.
"How nice," he said, getting fainter and dizzier than he already was. He lay his head down in the opposite direction, so he wouldn't have to face her piercing orange gaze.
"Isn't that what you wanted?" she asked.
"More than anything," he said, his stomach fluttering and his heart racing too quickly for comfort. If griffins ever felt nausea, he was feeling it. He might have fainted again, had it not been for the deafening roar of triumph in his head. He was shaking with feverish happiness.
"Flury?" she asked, more kindly this time. He leapt up, screeching in his huge eagle voice, wheeling around in the air. "Yes," Elda whispered, "he's definitely overreacting." She took off too, and found herself flying a wholly different pattern, wheeling round and round in the air as Flury flew opposite her. She found herself calling and screeching with happiness as well, totally out of control of her own instincts.
After a few minutes of this frivolity, they both landed together, nodding at each other in ascent.
"So, when's the wedding?" cawed Cazak as he loped to them. "You two are so sappy."
"Goodness, Flury, how long were you planning on waiting?" asked Blade, following soon after. It appeared that only those two had actually been awake.
"It's a good thing I did wait," said Flury to Blade.
"You knew?" Elda said demandingly, and they were both crowding Blade in feathery griffin pinions.
"Calm down!" Blade laughed, falling backwards into the sand as they pressed far too much on his balance.
"How can I?" screeched Flury, wild and ecstatic.
"Oh Flury, you'll get over it," said Cazak, shaking his head. He hadn't been nearly as excited when Callette had finally given in to his advances. Elda, not being the overly sentimental type, was a great deal calmer, though she seemed much happier than she had been. However, the specter of their enemies was still hanging over all of them, as evidenced by the unnatural storm brewing in the distance. Storms did not brew in the middle of the desert, let alone in the dry season.
Flury, losing his adrenaline rush, felt his weariness return.
"We need a few more days to rest," he said, slumping on aching legs and resting sore wings. "That mating flight took everything I got from a night of sleep. I'm in no condition to fight."
"How long will it take that storm to get here?" asked Cazak.
"My magic says about fours days, at that speed," replied Blade, who was staring intensely into the distance. A shining little light came hurtling through the air, and Blade caught it even as he sat in the sand. He closed his eyes and held the light cupped in his palms.
"It's not natural," he said, glaring. "But it's not quick, either." Kit prowled into their midst, looking at Flury intently.
"We need to build up our reserves, then," said Flury. He could feel malevolence resonating even now, when the storm was days away. "That storm is not dragon work. It is entirely unearthly altogether."
"Aren't dragons unearthly, though?" asked Cazak.
"Not in the way that storm is. No griffin could make something like that, either." Flury was talking in a tone of voice that echoed power, and no one dared doubt him. "It's like a story I once read, about a cleansing of the planet. Those who did not accept the natural protection the gods had given them in their magic and talents were wiped away completely. Those who use unnatural, evil powers to meet their goals. That magic cannot have been made by a mortal being."
"Why do you say so?" asked Elda.
"I just know," said Flury. "I can feel it."
"I'm not going to doubt you, Flury. Your magic is the strongest I've ever encountered. I've always underestimated you, to be honest. I won't be making that mistake again," Kit said respectfully. "Lead us into the peril, Flury. I don't have any doubts of your ability."
"But I'm confused," Cazak said, "you say the gods are trying to kill us? That doesn't make any sense."
"I don't know, Cazak," Flury said, shaking his head. To Elda, there was nothing and no one nobler in the world. She was quite surprised with this feeling, as she did not put her trust blindly into one being. "The Mark, or Senera's Crest, or whatever it's called, has something to do with it. The empty griffins, too."
"You mean what happened to my true body?" Hesian asked, joining them. "They took the part of me that was me and stuck in an entirely different body. I've been dreaming of seeing through my own griffin eyes again lately, and I think it's some sort of premonition. I've had them before."
"Why didn't you mention this until now?" Flury asked.
"Because I wasn't sure. But now I'm sure. Those griffins without anything within are the work of Senera's group, but are somehow being controlled by that storm."
"I see. It's slightly clearer now, but we must plan what we're going to do. It seems we have some enemies bigger than we thought."
"Obviously," said Blade. "So, Flury, what do we do?"
Author's Note:
Sometimes one wishes there were people likeFlury in one's own world. Wow, he finally told Elda! claps Oh, and for some reason I've had a slight inconsistency in those stupid medallion/collar things Senera's forces wear. The Mark, Senera's Crest, something of that sort. Oh well. Thank you for the reviews.